music to our ears for christmas

if you build or fix wheels at all you may identify with the following. even a part-timer like myself has had the opportunity to 'ping' the spokes, ostensibly to check spoke tension, but also because it makes a nice noise. in fact, it may surprise you to know that even the kevlar spokes on a set of lightweights make a funky pinging noise.

however, experimental musician and cyclist, flip baber, was commissioned by specialized bicycles to create a bicycle orchestra for their online christmas card, and he did a bit more than ping a few spokes. in baber's version of 'the dance of the sugar plum fairy' the glockenspiel and clarinet melody was created with spokes. The cello and violin pizzicatos were created with plucked derailleur cables. The tingly triangle was a bash on to a disc brake.The percussion was a medley of shifting, coasting, finger over turning spokes, chain pulls, braking, clipping into pedals, back-spinning, and air pssssing out of tyres.

get it fixed

we've featured 1lesscar on the post before, but at that time, the best you could hope for to show your support of this bicycle idealism was a few well printed stickers. well, derek, katie and cole have been busy with homegrown screen printing: the end result is a selection of sweatshirts, t-shirts, hoodies, caps etc, all of which are available through the 1lesscar website. their mission statement appears to be the provision of items that will allow them to continue their love of riding bicycles - an admirable notion, and one we all, doubtless, would like for ourselves.

of course, there is a by-product and that is the proselytising of the use of the bicycle as an alternative to the motor car, particularly the seemingly endless number of enormous four-wheel drive vehicles with one person present, that hog much of the roads these days.

in the spirit of the fact that we have the il pompino as our guest, the t-shirt shown here seems more than topical. to quote from the 1lesscar website: 'the fixter shirt is for anyone who thinks that it's cooler to be fixed than it is to be hip...'nuff said. price from $15.

it shouldn't happen to a bike

and here's me worried about taking the company colnago out in the wind and rain (though more to do with the rider than the bike). gerard vroomen of cervelo is one of those guys that has brought mountain bike sensibilities to the road bike world, and seems hell-bent on demonstrating this in the most entertaining of ways.

currently on the cervelo.tv website is this video 'to hell and back' where gv and some others from cervelo pedal some of their product through snow and over gravel roads 'to try and break them'. if you'd like to find out if they did, click the link above for a quicktime version of this seasonal video, or pop over to cervelo.tv for this and other 'entertainment'.

it's progress jim, but not as we know it...

when i were a lad, i owned a raleigh twenty 'shopping bike' (don't laugh) which had a front hub dynamo, rear rack with an enormous saddle bag (very handy for delivering newspapers for five years) and a sturmey archer three-speed rear hub. this hub had a tiny plastic port into which the junior mechanic was expected to put a few drops of three-in-one oil around once every six months or so. unfortunately, if the hub wasn't regulary cleaned on the outside, eventually it became difficult to find this port amongst the grime.

and while nowadays i am regualry brought bicycles with punctured rear tyres to repair, because nobody is willing to attempt to remove the wheel past the derailleur gear, it was altogether more of a palaver removing the real wheel on a sturmey-archer equipped bike. the trouble with the sturmey was that, when it decided to play up, there was no real way of fixing it without a trip to mr benzie's (the cantankerous bike shop owner in my home town), because you couldn't ever see what was going on inside.

at the time i commenced cycle repair on islay, i had cause to dismantle a sturmey three-speed hub and it's a manoeuvre i'd rather not repeat. it is no surprise to learn that it is often cheaper to replace a sturmey wheel than it is to try and identify which of the million and one tiny parts is no longer functioning.

however, with the advent of the mountain bike, derailleurs became all the rage, not least because of the incredibly low cost of manufacture, and the sturmey became almost the sole province of bikes such as pashley and raleigh 'sit up and beg's'. but do they still exist? well, yes, but in a diferent guise and a different company. once produced in numbers in nottingham, england, sturmey archer was purchased by the sun race company of taiwan in 2000, and all production transferred there.

according to their website, there are still numerous models of hubs, ranging from the basic three-speed version up to an eight-speed, and they even make cranks now. since sun race were responsible, if memory serves, for internal hub gears of their own (and perhaps still are), i have no idea how much of the current product line consists of rebadging of sun race originals, or if these are still constructed according to original sturmey principles.

internal hub gears may seem like an idea that's had its day, but with the advent of the rohloff 14 speed hub gear, and developments in downhill mountain bikes, it may be something that's on its way back. perhaps it's nicely ironic that the bicycle responsible for the demise of the sturmey, may just be the one that proves instrumental in its revival.

clothing to watch

just when you thought you had every item of cycling apparel that it was necessary to have, along comes something else you must have. the post has droned on all year about cycling.tv, mainly because it's the greatest invention since the parallel derailleur and the sole reason why broadband was invented. and poor james at dot-tv headquarters has had to wade through countless e-mails from me asking where i could get hold of a cycling.tv polo shirt.

but now my (and your) questions have been answered with an entire range of cycling.tv clothing, including the aforementioned polo shirt as well as cycle jerseys (long and short sleeve), cycle caps, shorts, socks and mitts. bizarrely, the website from where such apparel is available seems to be american based, as all the prices are in dollars, ranging from $12 for a pair of socks to $100 for a long sleeve jersey. considering the current favourable exchange rate, it may well be that those of us on this side of the pond are gaining a suitable discount - the moral being: if you want any of this stuff, buy it now (if you can - some items are already showing 'out of stock'. ironically it appears you can still get alternative cycling.tv jerseys from thecyclejersey.com supplier of the legendary ardbeg jerseys. and they're showing 94 in stock.

and then you can look like brian and anthony

you will need to have 'allow pop-ups' switched on in your browser to use this site, since that's how they let you know that items are out of stock - just so's you know.

since this piece was originally posted, cycling.tv inform me that the out of stock notices should disappear very soon.

it's a date

unsurprisingly, at this time of year, the world is awash with calendars: i've already had a freebie with this month's dastardly issue of procycling magazine (see article below), the brintoni special from velopress, a year planner free with trade mag bikebiz, and another couple of plain calendars with the trade suppliers' names at the top. i have no idea whether anyone really needs this number of calendars purely for the date information, but much like screensavers, they've become 'must have' accessories to daily existence.

most of them fit into two categories - the photos of cyclists passing sunflowers, or dates with space to write in, but no pics. i haven't quite figured out the captions yet, but the 2007 offering from headset gurus, chris king is verging on the creatively bizarre. yes, each month features one of chris king's colourfully anodised products but as larger than life props in the world of small plastic figures. to give you an idea of what i mean, have a look at the illustration from january 2007.

this limited edition calendar is available from the chris king website for the minimal price of $10, and promises all sorts of online goodies to enhance the experience throughout 2007. nice

ssshhhh

normal routine for the morning: get up, pop on the cycling clobber, have breakfast, take dog for walk, take dog home, on with the sidis, rapha winter cap, thermal gloves and helmet. get the company colnago out of thewashingmachinepost bike shed, switch on the flashing lights and head off for work (eventually).

same as most mornings, and probably very close to the routines being carried out in households throughout the uk, if not the world. except this morning, instead of donning a giro pneumo helmet, as has been my wont for the last three and a half years, i put on a brand new, shiny, white catlike whisper helmet, courtesy mick and andy at prendas. and while it seems like the sort of statement that would emanate from the catlike marketing people, i forgot that i had it on. no, honestly - halfway up to the tv mast (first mile or so is all uphill) i suddenly thought that i had left home without my helmet. fortunately, i was wrong, but it rather underlined the smiling difference in weight between the pneumo and the whisper.

and it's not just testament to the weight difference: since these things all have chin straps, even that seemed to have less presence than other helmets i've worn. winter's a bit of a crap time to review helmets really, because with a cap between head and helmet, it's somewhat straining the realms of credibility to make judgements on the ventilation afforded by the 39 air intakes (yes, i was sad enough to count them all - you know what marketing people are like). so that will have to wait until later - i will be wearing this helmet for a long time to come.

before the whisper made it as far as my head, straps had to be tightened, buckles arranged, all of which took...well, seconds, to be honest. the worst part about getting a new helmet is setting it up to fit your head, made less welcoming by occasional remarks to the effect that certain people have a particular type of helmet head. you know the spiel - if you don't have a giro shaped head/bell shaped head/specialized...well, you get my drift. what happens if you've just laid out around £100 on a new helmet, to discover that your head is not that shape? i don't know how true all this is - i've not had a great deal of difficulty getting helmets to fit my head, and the whisper was no exception. i jest not that it took less than five minutes from opening box, placing some of the extra pads supplied (which all fit on velcro dots), adjusting the straps and looking like samuel sanchez. well, if sam wore a white catlike, and i could sprint.

...and the kompact pro - jez hastings

it's not everyday that you can take a purchase from the box, and within seconds have it ready for use. the catlike kompact pro is one of them. i like the simple box and packaging - no need to take a short course in kempo to open it - and then a wee adjustment on the rear clips and away we go. it has a wide selection of internal pads, although the standard ones on it were fine for me. i found the chin pad around the strap a bit too much, so that stayed in the box, but it's worth trying out - some may find it comfortable, but i'm not one for things under my chin ­ we don't even own ties, let alone wear them here. it easily accepts a cap below and if santa loves me it will fit a rapha winter training hat under too!

not being a great one for jazzy colours (is it my age? ) the silver with mock carbon in-between the 21 apertures was just fine by me, although prendas also stock bright and team colours should one so wish. i'm also a weight weeny (less is more, and yes I did drill my levers and seat pins out in the the 70s, trying to do a pb on the local 10/25 course) so out came the scales and it came in at 240 grams (medium size). lighter than many other helmets in the same price bracket.

there is a subtle reflective 'catlike' logo on the rear 'after blaster' of the helmet ­ great for us northern riders - at this time of year ­ it is dark (and i mean darkdark) at 1600hrs and still so at 0830hrs. the logo can be seen a good distance away too. in use it fits very well and silly me, i thought my old one was good. the post is a fan of all things european ­ especially for the velo - hence campag, colnago, sidi, santini, rapha and the ardbeg jerseys etc. that all make regular outings on this site.

so far it has only had about 50kms of testing, however I can assure you that it will become a constant companion. 'light an' easy' ­ sounds like a radio station but much easier to tune into and you can choose the song.

jez hastings

both helmets are available from prendas from £119.95 for the whisper (team colours are dearer). and £79.95 for the kompact pro.

bottling it

it's a bit of a sport at this time of year, scanning press releases, web sites etc., for the more bizarre items that would make just the present for the cyclist who has everything (or very nearly). sadly, the popularity of many of these items revolves around a diminishing return between usability and price. witness the rapha/smythson rider's journal.

latest 'find' of this ilk is a set of six assos water bottles in their own carrier, emblazoned with the 'have a good ride' slogan on the side. parker international are listing this at £44.95, which would make it around £6.50 per bottle and the rest for the basket. no too exhorbitant when you look at it like that, but how many of us need six bottles in the first place, let alone a wee basket in which to transport them? in fact, i could almost throw six bottles from the back door into thewashingmachinepost bike shed and save the bother of carrying them.

still, if this is the very item that has been missing from your cycling armoury, it awaits you at parkers'.

tread carefully

i'd like to think that here at thewashingmachinepost we are considerate of the environment: jez runs islay birding and islay bushcraft (just the guy you want be with if you get lost over here) and i have divested myself of the car to use the colnago as sole means of transport. doubtless there are other things we could do to become softer on the environment, but you've got to start somewhere.

and it is our experience that cyclists, of whatever ilk, tend to have more concern for such environmental niceties, so it's nice to see that assumption well founded when along come belts made from old bicycle tyres.

beltoe and beltie are just the items of apparel probably missing from the contemporary cyclist's wardrobe. roadie stuff is generally self supporting, but there are baggy mtb shorts that i'm sure could do with belts like these, and it looks as if they were made for the ubiquitous pair of jeans.

beltoes are made from front tyres (more tread), while belties are made from rears, so they tend to be smoother. and it's a nice touch to have added the provenance to the attached tag. the belt above used to be a 700x35c and had done 7800 miles around the streets of london. the only real difficulty we had with this particular tyre belt, was slipping it through the belt loops on a pair of rapha fixed shorts, and it was long enough to fit two people. trivial, but there you go.

four different buckles are available, and complete belts come in at around £30 plus postage. if you've been struggling for the right christmas present for a cyclist, maybe this is just the ticket. and it's environmentally friendly. log on to velo::re

flying snakes

you can put things off for just so long, and then you're just making matters worse by procrastinating. and believe me, i have been doing this with the front end of the colnago for far too long. sunday ride conversations have revolved round the fact that i had not yet changed gear and brake cables, or new colnago bar tape to cover them up with.

however, i got there in the end. i've noticed that the outer cables on campagnolo factory fit seem to have a shorter shelf life than i'd prefer, but with the weather conditions over here, it's maybe not too surprising. so just to be flash and hopefully longer lasting, i fitted transfil 'flying snake' cables to the company colnago. so what's the difference between 'ornery' cables and flying snakes?

well, at face value, the coolness factor is almost up there with nokon cables. the outer cabling is carbon kevlar featuring the renowned woven pattern that we all love. the inner wires are regulation stainless steel (similar to the original campag). as a first for me, the outer cabling for the brakes is manufactured from the same compressionless housing used for the gearing, principal difference being the inner teflon liner is pre-fitted: on the gear cables, the entire length of the gear wire was encased in a removable teflon sheath.

the latter was intended to be left in place along the entire length of the inner, even where it would normally be exposed to the elements. and this is where i differed from transfil - i was a naughty boy and removed the sheath from all apart from the parts covered by the carbon kevlar, because a: it didn't look great and b: i'm not convinced by the mechanics of the system.

the teflon sheath is supposed to provide a high degree of waterproofing, and no doubt it does, but i can't see why stainless steel wire needs this. and while it may be capable of keeping moisture out, previous experience of a similar system demonstrated that it's just as efficient at keeping moisture in - condensation is no respecter of style.

disappointingly, despite being marketed as compatible with campagnolo systems, fitting the ferrules to the ends of the brake outers rendered the cable incapable of fitting the adjusters on a pair of chorus brakes. since the carbon kevlar outers are considerably stiffer than regular outer cable (because of the compressionless housing) it's a bit difficult (ie impossible) to get them to bend where they need to bend, when exiting the ergo levers. in practice this is not too awkward, but be sure to have plenty of electrical tape to fasten them tightly in the bar grooves.

summary: it takes ages to fit the blighters but pride bears no pain and only time will tell if they offer any improvement over campag's standard offering. but they look cool.

as an update to the latter paragraph, the weather cleared just enough this past two days to allow a few kilometres in an upright position. while i need to back off the rear brake cable a tad (too close to the rim), the mechanical efficiency of using compressionless housing for brakes seems well founded. and the gear cables, despite minor problems with the colnago's cable stops, are definitely operating more efficiently than the prescribed campag original fit. so i'm a happy bunny

flying snake cables are available from wiggle.co.uk at around £17.99 for brake cables and a similar amount for gear cables. this brings them in around £8 dearer than campag's own offering, but on the basis of a brief outing, it may be £8 well spent.

you can all have a good laugh at the fact that i had to look up google earth to find out where portland, oregon is. (well, do you know?) anyway, portland, oregon is the home of the very wonderful chris king cycle bits (headsets, hubs and things).

and it is also the home of ira ryan cycles.

no, i had never heard of him either until chris distefano (chris king) introduced us via e-mail while i was researching my piece on one inch steerers. ira builds stunningly beautiful lugged steel bicycles (you can see fine examples on his website). so i asked him if he'd mind doing an interview, he said yes, and here it is here. isn't the internet great?

for next christmas

i'm not too sure if the post is quite the sort of 'publication' that allows for such phrases as news flash or stop press (the latter would be technically incorrect anyway), but this sort of fits into one of those categories.

for entirely obvious reasons, we have flagged up the publication of in search of robert millar by richard moore, due for publication at the end of may/beginning june 2007 (see the robert millar pages), but now we can look even further ahead to the end of 2007. adrian bell of mousehold press is about to commence translation of jean bobet's 'demain on roule about himself and brother louison. publication at the end of 2007.

so that's christmas this year taken care of (cycling's golden age) and next year's too.

are they serious?

there can be little doubt that rapha cycle clothing is amongst the more expensive on the market, but having reviewed a goodly amount of their apparel, i am of the considered opinion (in which i am not alone) that it is well worth it.

however, the style meisters have just listed a leather bound training diary for the princely sum of £135! i saw a copy of this at the cycle show in london, and thought that the price was a printing error. silly me.

the training diary was developed in co-operation with smythson of bond street, london and uses hand made binding with stitched spines and gilt-edged pages.

and i quote-"Inside the journal are specially designed pages for personal information, training plans, ride reports and travel and expenditure records. with 250 individual ride record pages and three full year planners, the rider's journal should last most riders 18 months to two years. It will become a permanent record of all that suffering and, hopefully, glory."

time to let the bank manager know christmas may be a tad expensive this year.

too late?

apparently, and this is perfectly true, those of us in the uk expect to be able to purchase next year's calendars at the beginning of summer. i know this to be true because i have, on two separate occasions, been asked to start work on a calendar layout around easter (my other day job). or at least, we and the calendar publishing companies, like to have the calendars in the shops by early summer. i'm not sure that anyone actually buys them then. heck, i'm still trying to figure out october without worrying about dates in 2007.

so mentioning the availability of a calendar that you'll have to order from the usa in mid-october seems perfectly ok to me (even more so if you happen to live in the usa). and it's not the usual fare of photos taken through sunflowers of cyclists on carbon fibre in july.

david brinton, velonews magazine illustrator has produced 'les héros du vélo' - twelve great cyclists of the twentieth century caricatured in fine style (see accompanying illustrations) and presented in a 13"x13" format. it's available now, though in limited quantities, from the velopress website at a cost of $14.95 (which seems like a heck of a good price for a calendar if you don't mind me saying). one of these will grace washingmachinepost towers throughout 2007.

and it appears that velopress may present those of us this side of the pond with 2008 fayre at the recommended incredibly early time of year.